How Words Help Us Think: An Externalist Account of Representational Intentionality

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The mainstream assumption in cognitive science, artificial intelligence and analytic philosophy is that the defining characteristic of human cognition intentionality, the capacity to represent is biologically fundamental. This has driven research in cognitive science increasingly inwards and downwards to focus on activity at the neural and molecular levels, which, as Nancy Salay argues, is misguided. Revealing the central problems with this internalist idea, Salay puts forward an externalist paradigm of intentionality supported by recent empirical work in neuroscience, computer science, philosophy, animal cognition, developmental psychology, linguistics and anthropology. Drawing all of these insights together, she provides a unified framework in which to situate externalist views of intentionality, making progress towards a viable theory of cognition. Here is a comprehensive theoretical guide and a valuable empirical resource for those who view cognition through an extended and enactive lens.

Author Bio

Nancy Salay is Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy and School of Computing at Queen's University, Canada.